Upright piano



F. C. SOCIN UPRIGHT PIANO April 22? 1941.

Filed July 29, 1935 2 Sheehs-Shee'l l Patented Apr. 22, 1941 UPRIGHT PIANO Francis C. Socin, St. Charles, Ill., assigner, by mesne assignments, to The Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, Cincinnati, Ohio, a corporation of Ohio Application July 29, 1935, Serial No. 33,628

3 Claims.

This invention relates to upright pianos, and it is directed particularly to features of construction and arrangement which permit the harp and the case enclosing it to be of a minimum height, substantially no greater than the height of a grand piano, while ensuring a satisfactory volume of tone and a light, easy action, permitting of creditable performance. The invention involves special mechanical arrangements allowing the hammer action to be set lower in the case than is usual, but still keeping the parts accessible for adjustment or repair. The invention comprises various features and elements of construction in combination, as herein shown and described and as indicated by the claims.

In the drawings:

Figure 1 is mainly a vertical sectional view taken in a plane fore and aft of the instrument for showing typical elements of the hammer action and the special connections through which motion is transmitted thereto from the keys.

Figure 2 is a detail plan view of a desk with parts broken out to condense the view.

Figure 3 is a detail view of the action as shown in Figure l, but on a larger scale.

Figure 4 is a detail view of a modified connection between the key and the wippen, being taken as a vertical section similar to Figure 3.

Figure 5 is a vertical section showing another modification of the connection between the key and the wippen.

For use in small apartments and studios it is desirable to reduce the dimensions of a piano as much as possible without sacrificing quality of tone or touch, and in the present design I have succeeded in providing a harp which, when mounted on edge, that is, with the strings in a vertical plane, can be accommodated in a case which stands no higher than that of a grand plano of the usual dimensions. The total height is about forty inches. However, leaving the keyboard at the standard height so that it will be in the natural and usual position for the pianist seated in front of the piano, there is not sufllcient room above the level of the keyboard and within the reduced height of the case for mounting a piano action of the standard type employed in upright pianos. My invention involves lowering the action as a whole so that the usual wippens are disposed at some distance below the level oi' the keyboard, and then providing special mechanism for transmitting the key movements to the wippens in their altered position.

In Figure l the keys are shown at I, the key in the foreground, whose outline appears in full, being shown in depressed position, and the remaining parts of the action in corresponding positions. One of the strings is seen at 2, with the hammer 3 in contact therewith. The usual damper 4 is seen withdrawn from the string, and the backcheck 5 stands in its advanced position as supported by the wippen 1. The wippen is fulcrumed at 8 in the usual liange 9, mounted on the rail I0, which supports the several parts of the action. The forward end of the wippen is provided with an extension II, trending obliquely upward and having its under surface slightly curved. Under the key-bed I2, on which Vthe key manual is mounted, I provide a rail I3,

with a series of flanges I4, in which are pivotally fulcrumed a set of lever members I5, resembling the wippens of a grand piano action. At their outer ends the members I5 are formed with rounded surfaces I6 and the curvature of these surfaces and of the under sides of the wippen extensions II are such that as the wippens and members I5 swing about their respective pivots the contact between them will be a rolling contact without sliding. Each of the members I5 is ,connected to one of the keys I by a link I1, engaging the extreme rear end portion of the key so that when the key is depressed its motion is transmitted through the link I'I and lever member I5 to the wippen, and thence through the usual jack I8.

In order to keep the depth of the instrument from front to back as small as possible the length L of the keys is comparatively limited, and the action is positioned as close to the inner ends of the keys as possible. Therefore, the available lift at the inner end of each key is multiplied by the use of the lever I5, whose curved surface I6 contacts with the extension II of the wippen at a point farther from its pivot in the flange I4 than the point at which the link I 'I engages the lever. In addition, the rolling contact provided lby the design of the curved surfaces of the lever I5 and the wippen extensions II secures a silent and extremely easy operation of the action.

Another advantage of this construction is that it permits a high degree of accessibility for repair or adjustment. There is no permanent connection between the key manual and the action proper; there is merely the contact between the curved ends I6 of the levers I5 and the curved surfaces of the wippen extensions II. Therefore, the key-bed I2 may be designed to slide forward in the case, or even to be thus completely removed from the case with the manual keys as a unit,-carrying with it the links Il and levers l5, which will thus simply slide away from their `contact with the wippen extensions H, leaving the remainder of the action intact and exposed for access.

riChe case as viewed from the front resembles that of a grand piano having the usual cheeks Z, with a fall-board 2l pivoted at 22 between the cheeks, and with a fixed front panel 23 serving as a partial closure, The top may be made in two sections, 261 and 25, hinged at 25 midway between their front and rear edges, so that the section 24 will fold back upon the section 25. The latter is hinged to the back of the case at 21, so that the entire top may be folded down against the back to give access to the tuning pins, not shown. Just below the cover 243, I provide a desk or music rack 28, horizontally slidable in the end panels of the case, so that it may be adjusted forwardly or rearwardly to bring the music within comfortable range for the individual pianist.

At the rear of the case, as seen in. section in Figure l, the strings 2 extend directly in front of the metallic plate 53, with the laminated pin plank 3| directly behind it. A spacer block 32 is interposed between the pin plank and a series of upright posts 33, which are disposed at intervals in the back of the case. These uprights are connected at the top by a plank 3e and at the bottom by a rail 3.25, in the usual manner. A sounding board is seen spaced back from the plate 3i) and at a distance in front of the posts 33.

The plate t@ and the posts 33 extend to the extreme bottom oi the case, and are elevated from the supporting floor only by interposed domes 31, or metallic knobs, which transmit the weight of the instrument to the fioor, and thus tend to transmit musical vibrations and afford some resonance or amplification for the tones produced by the piano strings. In front of the plate 3Q and strings 2, the case includes a vertical panel 38 which, however, terminates at some distance bel low the key-bed l2, as seen at 39, and thus affords an opening through which the sound escapes for wardly. This opening may be closed by a screen of cloth or like material, as indicated in dotted outline at dll. It will be understood that when the cover 24 is folded back there is a relatively unobstructed opening upwardly and forwardly from the strings past the desk 28 and above the fallboard 2l, for the propagation of the musical vibrations, so that in spite of the compact construction of the instrument its tonal eect is as clear and unrestricted as that of a grand piano. At lil I have shown a fragment-ary leg member to vindicate the position of the lyre or pedal-supporting structure, but details of these parts are'omitted since they form no part of the present invention.

Figure i shows a modified connection between the key l and the wippen which is somewhat simpler than that shown in Figures 1 and 3. At the rear end of the key I, the link 5! extends down wardly into engagement with an extension 5| of the wippen la. The link 5i] is provided with adjustable and removable nuts 52 at its upper end,

which permit disconnection of the keys from the action, if desired, but it will be obvious that this arrangement is not quite so convenient as that in which the key manual is slidably disengageable from the wippens and the remainder of the action.

Figure 5 illustrates another simplified connection between the end of the key and the wippen when the wippen is mounted considerably below the level of the key manual. In this case the key Ia has secured to its rear end a rigid angular member 55, carrying a capstan screw 56 which bears on the under curved surface 5l of the wippen lb, in much the same manner as the capstan screw of a standard upright action engages the wippen when the latter is mounted to extend above the key, However, it will be evident that except by very careful designing of the head of the capstan screw 56 and extremely accurate assembly of the parts, it is difcult to secure a pure rolling action with this arrangement; but, it preserves the advantage of separability of the key manual from the remainder of the action by a simple horizontal sliding movement of the key frame, as already described in connection with Figure 1.

While there is shown and described herein certain specic structure embodying the invention, it will be manifest to those skilled in the art that various modifications and rearrangements of the parts may be made without departing from the spirit and the scope of the invention, and that the same is not limited to the particular form herein shown and described, except in so far as indicated by the appended claims.

I claim:

l. In an upright piano a hammer action mount ed in front of the strings with a wippen disposed below the level of the keyboard, a wippen finger fulcrumed below the keyboard and extending under the wippen in contact therewith, the contacting surfaces of said Wippen nger and the wippen being curved for rolling contact when said parts swing about their respective pivots, and a link connecting said wippen linger with the inner end of a key for actuation thereby.

2. In an upright piano including a case and a key-bed, manual keys supported thereon and an action mounted in front of the strings including wippens disposed below the level of the key manual, and linkage for connecting the keys to the wippens respectively extending below the latter, together with a front panel extending upwardly from the bottom of the case in a plane below said linkage and terminating below the latter leaving a gap between the top of said panel and the plane of the key-bed.

3.y In a piano having a hammer action with a pivoted wippen and a manual key, means operatively connected lto the key and arranged for transmitting motion therefrom to the wippen, said means including a member mounted to swing about a pivot and a part rigid with the wippen and in contact with said member, the contacting surfaces of said member and said part being curved for rolling contact when said member and the wippen swing about their respective pivots.

FRANCIS C. SOCIN. 

